Hope Shattered
by the stargate time traveller
Summary: Merlin's thoughts as he sends Arthur off and then later on the corpse of one of the women he loved the most, only will he get to speak to another woman whom he loved?


I own nothing. I just own this story.

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Hope Shattered.

As he watched the small boat carrying the corpse of his friend to whatever lay beyond, over the Lake his beloved Freya now resided in, Merlin felt as if he were about to collapse.

For a long time, he had hoped and prayed this moment would never come to pass, ever since that moment when he had learnt about Mordred's destiny, which was to kill Arthur.

And now Arthur was dead. The prophecy had been fulfilled, mostly because of his own fears and insecurity.

He had done it again.

So long ago, he had been told by Kilgharrah that Morgana, a girl whom Merlin had loved with the same passion as he had loved Freya, even before he had discovered a witch had cast a curse on her for the death of her son (what _was it _about witches always wanting revenge?), and instead of talking to her, especially when her dreams were getting out of hand, and even before Morgause's poison was seeping into her mind, twisting her against the people who she had once called friends - Good Grief, Morgana had even come to Ealdor to help stop it from being destroyed - he had poisoned her during that monumental mess when she had been the unwitting party to Morgause's plan to put Camelot to sleep.

And now Merlin could see the visible proof he had not learnt from his mistakes. So many ifs were being presented to him, and he felt it was rather cruel of the fates to shove it all into his face, especially now Arthur was gone.

If he had spoken to Morgana, told her about magic, and helped her to master several of her powers.

If he had spoken to Morgana, and told her Morgause did not have her best interests at heart - that one was the most painful, but it had become impossible when Morgana's betrayal came out and shocked the entire kingdom considering the way Uther's ward was known for her kind heart.

And of course, the biggest ifs which were only just surfacing now, but had never been so far from his mind…

If he had found a way to trust Mordred, even though the younger man had warned him long ago as a boy - when Merlin had reunited with Mordred as an adult, he had been harshly reminded of the glare he'd been on the receiving end of, and how Mordred had telepathically told him that he would never forget what he had done.

That was one of the biggest reasons why he had always kept Mordred at arm's length, but now his attitude was his undoing.

What about if he had helped Mordred save the love of his life, and found a way to ensure the other sorcerer trusted him, especially after treating him like something that had crawled into the latrine?

But… what if he had found a way to make Arthur see magic was not evil?

Oh, how many times had he wanted and yearned for that acceptance. It was ironic, horribly ironic, that Arthur had only accepted him for what he was when he was dying.

And now Merlin was out of his depth; he had thought that the recent mess where he had lost his magic before the Battle of Camnlann (Morgana had done it deliberately, knowing full well Arthur was strongest when he, Merlin, was nearby) had been bad enough, but at the time he'd had only a quick journey to make, Arthur's words about bravery, and the look of disappointed hurt there in his face, but this… this was the worst.

For the last ten years Merlin had served Arthur, and while he had found the monarch a nightmare to put up with at times, particularly during those long-ago days where he had only to worry about the next magical attack while he relied on Gaius and Kilgharrah to see him through, Merlin had definitely seen Arthur grow into someone infinitely different than the arrogant, spoilt bully he had first met all those years ago.

Even now Merlin was convinced Arthur had become an arrogant bully because of his father. Knowing Uther, the previous King of Camelot had shielded his son from the genocide he'd unleashed against the Old Religion for the death of his wife by spoiling him, but Merlin had been around Uther to get the idea into his mind, particularly when he discovered Arthur had only been brought into the world because of magic, because of Nimeuh, that Arthur had been spoilt because the old King had felt guilty because of his own actions during that time.

Merlin sobbed as he watched the small boat drift over the current over the Lake of Avalon. He had been so close, so close to saving Arthur's life, so close to getting him to the Sidhe before Morgana had gotten to them! All of those years of work protecting Arthur were over. Regardless of what the Dragon had said about the future of Albion, Merlin was still ambivalent about the future.

That reminded him. Morgana's corpse was lying in the woods, but a long way off. Merlin was torn, part of him wanted nothing more than to leave the body there to rot. No one would think anything less of him if he did that, in fact, many people would think that they couldn't think of a better punishment for the woman who had gone insane, betrayed Camelot and sided with their enemies, and was responsible for so much pain and grief over a long period.

And yet…

And yet, the decent part of Merlin, the part who would always love Morgana for the woman he had known, the woman who had fought by his side so many times, the woman whose innocence and kind heart had won his own when he had first arrived at Camelot, regardless of the great chasm which opened before them, could not allow that.

In any case, Merlin still harboured a tremendous amount of guilt over what he himself had done to her. He had ignored the pain she was going through when Morgause was twisting her, and he ignored the fact she was terrified when she discovered her powers, because she had known as he had, especially after those cases where Uther had summoned the Witchfinder to come to Camelot after his act of stupidity because he had not been able to resist the urge to use his magic in the open even though he had known it was a bad idea, and that time when he had arrived in the city where he had witnessed the execution of Thomas Collins, which had sparked Mary Collins' quest for revenge. For a whole year and a bit, he had worked hard to hide his powers, only for him to blow it in a moment of childlike stupidity when he should have known better.

Morgana had known all about the attitude towards magic in Camelot, she had grown up watching as people ranging from powerful sorcerers to druids who were the most peaceful in the realm were slaughtered like animals. She knew if she created even the smallest spark anywhere near Uther she would be killed. Uther had never made exceptions, and even after that close call when Arthur had brought his father's long gone spirit back into the world, that old loathing and fear of magic was still strong, showing that even in death, even when he must be seeing what was going on in his sons' life, Uther was still ignorant of so much.

Merlin was still torn about what he was going to do with Morgana's body, and he couldn't help but wonder what would happen if he sent her out over the Lake in the same manner as her half brother. Did she even deserve that after everything that she had done? In the end, he made the slow journey back to the place where he had impaled her with Excalibur when he could no longer see the small boat carrying Arthur's own body away over the Lake.

Even as he walked to where he had left the corpse of a woman whom he had loved once, Merlin was still torn about what he should do; it wasn't as though he were particularly pressed for options about how to dispose of the corpse, but it was just how he could do it that bothered him.

Merlin still recalled the fact this woman was the same one who had caused so much death and destruction, and yet he would always remember her from those old days in Camelot where everything had been so much more simpler, more so before the second year where everything became so much less kind.

Merlin closed his eyes briefly as he walked before he reopened them, forcing himself to try to forget the chaos of his second year. It was ages ago, luckily, and truthfully he didn't like thinking about those moments where he had been exposed to so much pain; the simultaneous loss of Morgana, the release of Kilgharrah and his own guilt over the devastation the Great Dragon had unleashed on Camelot and the way his own father had died when he had just gotten the man back…

It was sometimes too much.

When he got there, he found that nothing had touched her body just yet.

Merlin blew out a slight breath as he studied the woman's body. Morgana's tattered black dress which she had begun to wear during her self imposed exile caught his heart, but what really threatened to tear it apart was just how _old _Morgana looked, instead of being around Merlin's own physical age (he still had no idea what the magic in those crystals had done to him, even if they had restored his magic; but when he had been trapped there, Merlin had felt…. different, and it was a feeling he doubted he would ever be rid of that feeling), with the lines around her face, indicating stress which matched the greying strands in her hair.

Merlin almost broke down again, knowing it was because of him that Morgana had become a monster. It took a while for him to get back out of it, and when he did he realised he had made his choice. He was about to pick up the woman's body and carry her down to the Lake, much like he had struggled with Arthur's dying body, but this time he paused.

Cursing himself for not using this spell on Arthur, though at the time he had to admit he had been too scared Arthur's time had been running out, Merlin almost appreciated the irony on using it on his warped half-sister instead, and he cast a spell to take himself and Morgana straight to the Lake.

Merlin had never really liked teleportation spells even if they were really useful. The feeling of wind and earth being swept around him and corpse of one of the few women whom he had always loved and the sick feeling to the stomach had never really sat well with him.

But when he got there, he placed Morgana's body on a second boat and sent it off.

As he had done with Arthur, Merlin watched as Morgana's boat slowly drifted away. He hoped in death she would find some peace, and that she would find it within her soul to forgive him for his own mistakes because Merlin was unsure if he himself would ever be able to.

Once it was over, Merlin walked away, hoping to put distance between himself and the Lake; so many people whom he had loved and liked over the years had died and had been sent over the surface of the placid lake; Elyan, Lancelot, Freya, and now Morgana, and Arthur. He had just about had enough.

But he was shocked when he heard a voice behind him.

"Merlin."

Merlin swung round, and he almost fell to the ground when he saw Freya. "Freya?" he whispered.

Freya gifted him with that familiar smile tinged with kindness and sadness rolled into one. "Hello, my love. I felt your sadness when you sent Morgana and Arthur over the Lake."

Merlin nodded and looked down. "I failed, Freya. I failed."

"You didn't trust Mordred," Freya said, not sounding accusatory. "You were frightened, Merlin. I understand that."

"I was torn," Merlin confessed; he had never been able to confess this to even Gaius, but since the events he had wanted to prevent had happened anyway, there was no point denying anything anymore. "Torn between reaching out to him, but I was afraid if I did, then Arthur would die."

Freya nodded. "That is what makes you human, Merlin," she said sadly. "We make mistakes. Every sorcerer makes them, and they have terrible consequences down the line. Just because you are Emrys doesn't mean you're infallible."

Merlin felt a flash of anger. He hated the prophecies which had knitted his life together, making him feel like he was a puppet of the Old Religion. There had been moments, particularly ones which were written in stone already when he had wondered what the point was if everything meant to occur would occur.

Freya saw the anger flash over Merlin's face. "What's wrong?" she asked in concern.

Merlin felt bad for scaring her, and he kicked himself. "Oh, I was just thinking about what the point is if everything I'm meant to do is going to happen anyway."

"Not all of it was," Freya replied, looking back at him sadly. "There were some moments which were not fixed in time. I exist outside of time, Merlin. I saw everything occurring to you, and I could see moments where you reached a decision, and you chose a different path to what happened next. To make matters worse, you were frightened some times and you were sometimes manipulated into making them by outside forces; the Great Dragon and Gaius among them, though sometimes their advice was unintentional."

"What about Kilgharrah?" Merlin asked, remembering those moments where the Dragon had twisted him when he had been younger and too stupid to know anything different, all for his own gain, "he only gave me hints and tips about how to deal with things. Okay, so he helped me, but he wanted me to kill Morgana-."

"To stop Morgana from becoming a powerful enemy for you to handle while Avalon was being created," Freya replied. "If you had poisoned her and not bothered to hand Morgause the antidote, you would only have had Morgause to deal with. She wasn't as powerful as her half-sister, and she knew it. The Dragon did not know everything, Merlin. He still doesn't; he wanted you to kill Morgana, so then a door would be closed forever. Unfortunately, it was left open, and this has happened. You were never to know that."

While he was reeling under the mass of so many options he'd had, Merlin already knew that, and a part of him wondered how he would have fared against Morgause rather than her sister. But Freya stopped him. "Personally, I think you made the right decision here and there, Merlin; granted, I didn't like the way you betrayed Mordred, but the truth is some things are meant to happen. Mordred was destined to have a hand in Arthur's death. Believe me, I saw the different possibilities; some of the possibilities show him deliberately killing Arthur in more than one way, or being indirectly responsible. If you hadn't done what you had during those moments, then things could be much worse.

"If you had killed Morgana and let your guilt eat your heart out, Camelot could have been destroyed by Morgause, and Arthur would have died before Albion was created."

Freya cast a brief look over the Lake and she turned apologetically back to Merlin. "I have to go now, Merlin."

"Must you?" Merlin almost collapsed to the ground as he was a stones' throw from begging her to stay. He had lost two people whom he'd cared about, and the chance to speak to Freya made him aware of how desperate he was.

"I am afraid so, my time in this realm is limited. The longer I'm here, the more my curse reasserts itself," Freya sighed regretfully, and indeed Merlin thought for a moment she was about to cry. "But think about what I said. Your hopes may be shattered, but you have so much ahead of you. Goodbye, my love. Please visit me again, it sometimes gets boring," Freya said as she sank slowly beneath the Lake.

Merlin stayed by the Lake for nearly the whole day, taken by surprise by what Freya had said, but when he heard an owl in the air, he came back to his senses. He was surprised by how much time had passed, but he pushed that aside as he walked from the Lake. He didn't give a thought about how long he would need to walk in order to return to Camelot.

But he didn't care.

He needed the time to himself while he tried to get over his mess of thoughts about what had happened; the events of the last few days were getting to him. He had gotten his powers back after they had been removed, and he had defeated his old friend when she had started a battle he had been aware of for a long time, and he had told Arthur about his magic before he had died. But the talk with Freya had shocked him because he had never imagined there being other possibilities before, but even as he tried to imagine what could have happened if he had chosen a different path, Merlin realised he couldn't; his mind went back to what Freya had said, the destruction of Camelot.

He tried to imagine what kind of state he would have been in during that point, but he pushed it aside.

He was getting a terrible headache.


End file.
